In 2004, Abercrombie & Fitch was facing a dilemma common among retailers: the youth-focused clothing company was maturing, leading to slower sales growth. The company hit upon success in the 1990s with premium-priced clothing geared to 18- to 22-year olds and sought to extend its brand to kids and high-schoolers with the new Abercrombie and Hollister chains. As the economy weakened in 2000 and competition grew, Abercrombie & Fitch first turned to cost controls, but by 2004 realized it needed to reinvigorate sales. In this case students consider Abercrombie & Fitch's financial information as well as its history, pricing, and store footprint to recommend strategic decisions for reviving sales.

Professor Feiner has been a member of the prestigious Institutional Investor All-America Research Team since 1974. He is considered by many institutional investors as the expert on Wal-Mart Stores through his eleven treatises titled Wal-Mart Stores An Encyclopedia Series. One of his most recently published Wal-Mart Stores report was Encyclopedia X- Building a Global Brand. He joined Lehman Brothers in...